Bitcoin Cash Listed On Coinbase – A Coordinated Pump & Dump?

In the last hours we have experienced a strange situation that bothered investors and Bitcoin supporter. Bitcoin Cash (BCH) has been added to Coinbase (and GDAX) yesterday evening. But before the announcement, Bitcoin Cash price increased $1,000 dollars in a matter or hours. This situation raised concerns at Coinbase. It seems that an employee has disclosed private information about Coinbase’s decision.

Did Bitcoin Cash Want to Dump Bitcoin?

Once that Bitcoin Cash started to be listed in Coinbase and GDAX, Bitcoin lost $2,000 dollars in two hours, without a deep understanding of what was going on. GDAX was operating with problems, some users reported that it crashed some minutes after the announcement. Besides that, orders to buy Bitcoin Cash were not filled and cancelled as soon as it started to be available for trading.

How is it possible an increase in its price just before the announcement? Did an employee leak private information? Brian Armstrong, Co-founder and CEO at Coinbase has released a statement about the situation:

“Today we announced support for Bitcoin Cash (BCH). It appears the price of Bitcoin Cash on other exchanges increased in the hours before our announcement,” he wrote. “We have had a trading policy in place for some time at Coinbase. The policy prohibits employees and contractors from trading on “material non-public information”, such as when a new asset will be added to our platform.”

CNBC Involved

Different comments have been made about this topic in different social media. In Reddit, a user has filed a SEC complaint against Coinbase for insider trading on the BCH release. The BBC and Business Insider reported about this situation too.

WhalePanda, a Twitter user, has shown how Paul Wasensteiner’s wife, Gaby Wasensteiner, are working together to promote Bitcoin Cash. Paul Wasensteiner works at the Bitcoin Cash Fund. This wouldn’t be a problem, but Gaby Wasensteiner works for CNBC as Marketing Manager. In different occasions, she has been campaigning for Bitcoin Cash and against Bitcoin.

At the moment, Bitcoin Cash is being traded at $4,296 dollars and has increased 72 percent in the last 24 hours.